Image: Working-class Writers’ Collective
By Jake Trelease
In a rainy morning in 1954, Sid Chaplin climbed out of the pit and handed Raymond Williams a letter: ‘just ten percent of authors originate from a working-class background,’ it read. The words were familiar, but lacked context. Seeking clarification, Williams presented the letter to Catherine Cookson, who had just appeared on an adjacent ballast hill. She read the letter — frowned and coughed — before nodding in disgust. Inspired by this moment, Chaplin would go on to write The Day of the Sardine, Williams would pen Border Country, and Cookson, despite selling over one hundred million copies, would go on to reside in charity shops and obscure satellite channels for eternity.
This fabricated anecdote shows literary authority, even if I possess none. It shows an awareness of Sid Chaplin, and that I’ve read Williams; it might even convince you that I know the works of Cookson like the back of my hand. It demonstrates that when it comes to writing about working-class writing, just like working-class writing itself, there’s a formal expectation of how things should be done, a solemnity that must be met. What it doesn’t do is highlight the fact that hundreds of working-class writers have rarely been given the time of day.
After nearly two decades of austerity, it’s now almost impossible to enter or maintain a career in the arts if you’re working-class. In publishing, especially, austerity, along with falling readership, has been used to justify risk-averse commissioning, often at the expense of underrepresented writers. In an open letter published last month, the UK’s leading independent publishers highlighted how reduced funding and rising production costs have affected their ability to survive. Historically, it’s these smaller presses, alongside magazines and journals, that have acted as gateways for underrepresented writers and literary experimentation. If these publishers cease to exist, or prize money is viewed as collateral damage for cost-cutting, it’s underrepresented writers who will suffer; by taking creative and political risks, these companies help to scout for award-winning talent before larger corporations swoop in and leech off their work.
As Yara Rodrigues Fowler pointed out in Tribune in September, publishing is in fact surprisingly flush with cash. Like all other areas of society, fair distribution is the problem. Fowler highlights the eight-figure deal of Pointless star Richard Osman, whose fifth book in his The Thursday Murder Club series sold over 145,000 copies in its first week. When compensation for writers is disproportionately absorbed by celebrity writers, where does that leave underrepresented or working-class writers who may be lucky to earn £7,000 annually from their writing? There’s no denying that Osman brings in the cash, but there is a formula behind his success. The publishing industry knows how to cultivate a bestseller; we see who they prioritise and who gets ignored. As integral as selling books is to financial sustainability, money should not be the true metric of literary success.
Does You Don’t Take Access?
There’s no doubt that there are plenty of genuine people trying to improve access to the publishing industry. Questions surrounding class are increasingly common within job applications and submission portals, specifically questions regarding the profession or the highest level of education held by the parents. However, as well-intentioned as these questions may be, it’s not enough. A bachelor’s degree is no longer the golden ticket it once was. Questions about professions tend to be listed in order of how the middle-class respects them, and fail to consider that traditionally working-class professions like plumbers or electricians frequently command better wages than traditionally middle-class professions like publishing or teaching. Social mobility is an oversight. The upwardly mobile retired son-of-a-miner, born in 1951, who seeks funding to work on his working-class masterpiece from the perspective of his liberal brainworm, is on equal footing with the skint, university-educated working-class person of today working full-time in a supermarket.
Sometimes, class is actually disregarded altogether. By excluding class from demographic questioning, intersections of gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disability, geography, and social mobility too become ignored. As a result, publishers and employers negate the idea that an ethnic minority can be middle-class or that there are material differences even within classes based on whether you live in London or not. For example, within publishing at least, a white working-class male from the Yorkshire seaside town of Redcar hardly has any advantage over a middle-class Londoner of Nigerian heritage with a story to tell about the Nigerian diaspora. Obviously, both writers deserve a look in, but it can feel like publishing, more abstractly, considers certain minorities more literary than others.
Again, we see well-intentioned measures to counter these geographic disparities, with many London-based publishers often calling for submissions from ‘writers from the north’. While requesting this may be a condition of securing funding, grouping northern experience into one homogeneous class negates the idea that growing up in Bootle (a town in Merseyside) can be different to life in rural Allendale (a village in Northumberland). It is as stupid as viewing the south as a melange of London, Cornwall, and Kent. It’s uncertain whether this lack of nuance is down to ignorance or oversight, but it doesn’t make the outcomes any less true. The relevant questions to be asking are about industry connections.
Equally, time is another factor that weighs heavily on the working-class writer. It takes time to write a good book — and arguably even longer to write a bad one, or achieve the financial security to angle yourself into a position where a semblance of a career in the arts seems viable. Outside of work or family commitments, time is a precious commodity for the working-class writer; an hour of writing here and there is not enough. You could say that working and raising children are classless issues, but this disregards the type of work different classes do. The middle classes are much more likely to work in non-manual jobs that allow them to work from home, with flexibility, and within sociable hours. The freedom to find employment where your sense of self remains intact, and your spirit isn’t broken, is an overlooked condition of work. That said, time does affect certain demographics disproportionately, despite class, especially when we consider traditional expectations surrounding gender and domesticity.
Time, or lack of it, will significantly shape the type of work a person can produce. Most publishers ask that a writer should only submit their work for consideration once they’ve completed a full manuscript. However, this common-sense approach is nullified when we see middle-class writers offered commissions based on a successful Guardian article or a speculative chapter aided by a family contact. This is not to say that writers who gain entry this way lack talent, rather that they exist in worlds where these contacts are commonplace and a career in the arts is valued, encouraged, and realistic.
Once commissioned, these writers now have the time, security, and justification — irrespective of whatever compensation they’ve been offered — to develop their work. In doing so, they can refine ideas and move onto new ones, while the working-class writer can remain stagnant, attempting to present a fully realised work. It’s not philistinism that discourages the working-class writer, but the constraints associated with finance and free time. When we consider time in this context, it makes sense that short stories and poetry are often the most common starting points for working-class writers. Naturally, though, these forms are often unfavoured by publishers and receive very little compensation.
Once the working-class writer does manage to complete a manuscript, they must face the critique of the middle-class commissioner. Submission guidelines often request that writers do their research to ensure they find a publisher that aligns with their work. But what if ninety percent of publishers cater to middle-class novels about fuck all? By design, a middle-class commissioner is more likely to be closed off to the nuances of contemporary working-class life. From the outside, it can feel like publishers see the label ‘working class’ as nothing more than a marketing angle for writing that fits into the mould of what the term working-class is to them. When publishers are unable to see beyond outdated images of class, working-class writing suffers. A working-class novel may be overlooked because its experimentation with form or its language, semantics and structure are not understood.
Humour, for instance, is rarely valued or considered literary. Solemnity, on the other hand, is required to be considered worthy by the middle-class commissioner. A middle-class writer can convince the middle-class commissioner of the quality of their work by describing their novel as ‘playing with the boundaries of form, theme, and the body’; the book is then marketed as a ‘tour de force’ for its ‘unflinching prose’, and supported by criticism and reviews. Some working-class writers may even adopt this language to find acceptance, but at what cost? (To be clear, this is not a call to dumb-down the way we talk about books, rather a request to speak normally, in sentences of substance and value. No language is more intellectual than another!)
The middle-class commissioner — as a stereotypical, gatekeeping archetype, rather than a term for all middle-class people — might find it easier to perceive why the work of a writer from Osaka would be thematically or structurally different to a Western writer, and they may even be more receptive to any class angle. But the same is not afforded to working-class writers in Britain, who, deep in the recesses of their minds, are white, loutish men zip-tying flags to lampposts. Perhaps the Japanese writer stimulates some post-colonial, orientalist intrigue that the British working-class writer doesn’t?
The Working-Class Novel
In a firmly post-industrial, post-Brexit Britain, the working classes are demographically different to previous versions of themselves. Today, people from working-class backgrounds are more likely to work alongside the middle-class than ever before. Culturally, class distinctions are used by politicians to secure votes, and traitors are pilloried for their uncertainty about the price of milk. Take the earlier example of the plumber, who is proud of his working-class roots but economically middle-class. Historically, these class differences provided clarity, and the ‘working-class novel’ was easier to define. Despite the development of class signifiers over time, the type of working-class writing being published today remains the same, often entrenched in a middle-class conception of working-class life. Therefore, a new form of working-class writing is needed to take on the social and cultural issues of now.
In his 1979 lecture, British Working-Class Literature after 1945, Williams defines the ‘working-class novel’ as a work that depicts the social and economic relationships between classes. Without this key element, he argues, the class novel, even when rooted in traditionally working-class environments, can simply be reduced to regional literature. Williams mentions the poet John Clare, as well as the ‘industrial novels’ of the 1800s written by Elizabeth Gaskell and Charles Dickens, for highlighting the impact of the Industrial Revolution on working-class life. Although plenty of ‘proletarian literature’ was being produced in the more radical circles of the time, depictions of the human relationship to work within literature were unusual.
This was a time when novels tended to focus on nobility and aristocrats, rather than the working man. This dominant form influenced the type of working-class writing being produced. By writing about the lives of the working class, Dickens became a significant anchor point in the history of working-class writing. Without him, we might not have had Robert Tressell or Cookson. Without them, we might not have had the more politically-minded or experimental writings of Jack Hilton, Jack Common, Barry Hines, Alasdair Gray, or Ann Quin. This isn’t to say that these writers were influenced by each other or those who’d come before, or that they were connected in any way. However, almost every working-class writer acts like a piton hammered by a climber into a cliff; each writer provides a foundation which the next can either continue or reject.
If opportunities for working-class writers are eroded, there will be less working-class writing published. Without a continuous stream of working-class writers driving their spikes into the rock, gaps and distortions will form with working-class literary consciousness. Without contemporary anchor points, working-class writers are forced to find inspiration and meaning in middle-class forms or outdated working-class texts. You can take as much inspiration from Hines’ Kes as you like, but a working-class novel set in 2025 shouldn’t look, feel, and sound like 1960s South Yorkshire.
Today, as in the 1800s, the historical ostracisation of working-class writers from published literature has resulted in a dominant form being produced. Douglas Stuart’s 2020 Booker Prize-winning novel Shuggie Bain naturally received plenty of accolades for its depictions of working-class destitution. As much as the book is a realistic depiction of Stuart’s life in 1980s post-industrial Glasgow, it fits the publisher’s mould perfectly.
Yet novels like Shuggie Bain, often marketed for their class narrative, rarely highlight the systematic influences from above that create these dynamics. They typically depict a working-class protagonist who must leave or discredit their origins to succeed. In the case of Shuggie Bain, it’s clear that Stuart is not claiming that homophobia and alcoholism are issues solely of the working class, and it’s perfectly conceivable why Shuggie, as a character, without an astute awareness of the systematic constraints at play, might grow to resent his origins. It can be difficult to target your anger upwards when the people challenging you are within your own community. If the book wasn’t marketed for its class narrative, this could probably be overlooked; however, when the class narrative is commodified, does the working-class writer have a responsibility to show more than just a simple reality?
Limited portrayals of working-class life not only colour external perceptions of class, but also how we process our own lived experiences. The working-class writer may assume that to find ‘success’ within publishing, this is the life you must portray. This is not to say there is an over-saturation of white, working-class fiction; rather a conscientious, class-driven or intersectional approach should be taken that is aware of the textual tropes that preceded it.
Novels like this often become shorthand for any work produced by a white working-class male. Historically, these books tend to depict a bright young man shackled by his regressive hometown, who leaves it all behind to prove that social mobility is possible. These novels are rarely marketed as literary fiction, and if produced by working-class women, are often ‘reduced’ to genre fiction. Even in her own time, Cookson was frustrated with her simple categorisation as a ‘romance writer’, feeling her work dealt with more important social themes.
What unites Chaplin, Williams, and Cookson is their upbringing in the coal mining regions of pre-war North East England and South Wales. In many ways, their formative years define the stereotype of early twentieth-century working-class life. Cookson’s novels depict an Edwardian South Shields filled with coal mines, shipbuilding, and vice. Chaplin’s work similarly represents a post-war Newcastle often grouped with the kitchen sink realism of the ‘angry young men’. Williams, as much as his fiction depicts the coal-mining communities of his youth, is perhaps the outlier of the three. He went on to study at Cambridge and carved out an academic career, making himself credible. This is not to say these writers were playing to a stereotype, but that their writing depicts a period of working-class life that became a dominant mode.
Williams has commented that he rewrote Border Country eight times, so that he could establish a novel that felt true to form. Although his protagonist does leave and return, the book highlights the fractures and resentments that can occur from leaving your working-class origins. Just because his protagonist has moved on, it does not mean his origins have ceased to exist or develop. If working-class literature is dominated by endless ‘Shuggie Bains’, more intersectional, less-obvious class stories will be overlooked in favour of profit.
Looking to the Future
At surface level, there are many reasons to be positive. In recent years, ‘big five’ publishers like Hachette and Harper Collins have opened regional offices in the North of England, hoping to secure tax breaks, cheaper rent, and a new generation of talent. One of the latest projects to support working-class writing is The Bee magazine, an online journal in partnership with New Writing North and Arts Council England. It’s important that such institutions remain genuinely accessible to working-class writers rather than becoming symbolic. Regional institutions, especially, need to be accessible to all, not just the socially mobile, happy to tow the party line or play the token northerner.
Growing up in South Shields, I may as well have been 2,000 miles from the cultural opportunities that existed in Newcastle, whether through ignorance or poor marketing. Regional institutions must be aware of these cultural inequalities (even within the regions themselves) if they are to have the most impact. In the North East, work is being done to combat these inequalities. Sunderland has recently been awarded ‘Music City’ status, South Shields is home to the National Centre for the Written Word, while a five-million-pound centre of writing is planned for Newcastle.
The North East is not known for its literary prowess, despite many writers coming from or writing in the region, including those mentioned previously, and playwrights and screenwriters such as Gordon Burn, Pat Barker, and Bede. One of the most prevalent literary movements of the region took place in Newcastle’s Morden Tower in the 1960s, when poet Tom Pickard brought the likes of Basil Bunting and Allen Ginsberg to the city. Yet despite its significance, the tower remains fairly anonymous in the region’s dominant cultural memory.
More recently, North East writers including Eliza Clark and Jessica Andrews have produced critically-acclaimed novels. There’s also the arrival of Kulvert Books, a poetry press that clearly takes inspiration from the more radical elements associated with the Morden Tower. The building’s influence is also present in some of the area’s emerging writers. A clear line of inspiration is visible in the poems of Pickard and Bunting, particularly within Briggflatts. There’s an abruptness of language, an outsider sentiment — something semantically Northumbrian that resonates with the North East writer today.
Undoubtedly, these funded institutions play a significant role in building community at the local level, but we must ensure they don’t become window-dressing for wider structural inequalities. Sometimes it can feel like these larger, government-funded institutions use working-class artists as pawns to secure future funding or justify cheaper compensation, only to disregard them when larger artists come calling.
Time and time again, we’ve seen publishers and prizes calling for submissions from new or underrepresented writers, only to award opportunities to already established writers or those already with a foothold in the industry. Sometimes these awards can feel like a PR exercise, with publishers raising their profile by connecting themselves to a rising name. There’s no doubt that the majority of small publishers and regional arts institutions do their best to support local artists, even when they are reliant on government funding. But this reliance on financing creates an unhealthy ecosystem for artists: an environment where writers are reluctant to bite the hand that feeds them.
While referring to writing in terms of success and failure is mostly unhelpful, funding for smaller publishers and regional institutions is often determined by mostly intangible metrics of inclusion or community impact rather than more abstract artistic merit. A successful funding application is more likely to be determined by increased footfall and community outreach rather than a Nobel Prize winner from Blyth, as much as both things are possible.
Reframing what success is can be beneficial to the working-class writer, but it often means rejecting the idea of having a book in print. It’s generally easier to be idealistic about rejecting traditional publishers once you’ve already made use of them. The reality is that working-class writers must plough on regardless, and use these limitations radically. All said, there is no requirement for the working-class writer to write about class; there are many different reasons for writing, but in times when cultural depictions of class are used increasingly by right-wing dickheads to divide us, the alternative is worse.
With something as insular as writing, community can be difficult to find. However, community needn’t mean meeting up for coffee. It can be abstract, whether sharing opportunities or supporting other writers when needed. In the words of the 1970s Scottish band Orange Juice, it is high time to rip it up and start again. Though the majority of working-class art that has stood the test of time has often been produced in adversity, grants in the past were more available, education was more affordable, and further back, aristocratic patronage still existed. In 2025, we do not have that luxury.
Still, by understanding the class writing of the past, we can reflect on the material conditions of the present and critique them effectively. We must strive to create a healthy ecosystem where experimentation and critique are encouraged, and a variety of stories are welcomed. We must do the hard yards to encourage each other where we can, in our own circles, in homes, and in schools. We must strive to change how art is viewed, not just as a spare-time, voluntary or unofficial activity, but as an opportunity to create true meaning in our lives. Often meaning is affirmed by external forces, and so, we must be the ones who encourage each other. Sadly, the limitations placed on working-class writers can be demoralising, and exhausting. As Williams once said, ‘working-class success’ is often determined by a ‘certain piece of education at the right time’ — a push in the right direction, perhaps by a teacher, parent or an opportunity that emboldens us early on.
Working-class writing has the ability to add validity to our lives. Learning about the hidden wealth of otherwise normal people is a weird experience that can shape, radicalise, and positively politicise your words. In presenting complex working-class characters, we create new distinctions, and become more sure of our complexities than our limitations. This works to benefit everyone.
Just because Billy Elliot exists, we should not allow the culture industry to make claims about market saturation. To date, the closest thing I’ve had to a life-changing experience with art was watching There’s Only One Jimmy Grimble, starring Ray Winston and Robert Carlyle; directed by John Hay, the film is essentially Ken Loach for kids. The soundtrack not only provides a gateway to other cultures; the film itself also mimics a sensibility of how life really felt (not that I was ever bullied in an inner-city Manchester comprehensive). The same goes for other times writing has moved me — though, in school, I found the approach to literature limitating. How do you use James Joyce’s Dubliners if you have no mechanism to apply its value to life?
Working-class writing can be life affirming. Publication is rarely easy, but writing is a human and empathetic way to find meaning and value. The world would be a better place if there were a hundred Jimmy Grimbles for every The Thursday Murder Club. Much like writing about work in the 1800s, stepping away from the Instagram reels and AI slop to create a human-centred provocative piece of work can feel radical. Working-class writing, both published and unpublished, celebrated and ignored, is necessary — but ideally, we’d like to be paid for it.
